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grateful to all members of this Council for their very kind help during the past year and I can assure members that I would be delighted to receive any comments or criticisms of our work in order that the functions of the Council could be made more effective and more realistic. (Applause).
CHAIRMAN :—It will doubtless have been observed that among the many matters raised by Members in their speeches last month, housing and slum clearance received the most attention. This was also the case last year, and, indeed, it is not surprising in view of the predominance of this great social problem in the Colony. I do not intend, however, to deal with either of these matters in my reply today. Questions connected with the work of the Housing Authority are best dealt with in the meetings of that body; while, as to slum clearance, Government has agreed that a housing survey must be conducted first, before the Special Committee on Housing can submit any further recommendations.
One other important matter was raised last month which is also not strictly speaking within the sphere of the Council—the question of the franchise and of the electoral register. I will see that the remarks of the Member in question are noted in the proper quarters.
Turning now to other matters, both Dr. Lee and Dr. Bell spoke in favour of the creation of a separate Department of Public Health under the control of this Council. Public Health, as Dr. Lee said, covers a wide field; it embraces such matters as port health, school health, M.C.H., social hygiene, epidemiology and so forth. I do not think one could support the suggestion—if indeed there is such a suggestion—that all these services and the staff responsible for them should now be brought under the control of this Council. However, it is true that within the field of environmental hygiene, which is the Council's main concern at present, there are important sections of our work, such, for instance, as the control and inspection of licensed premises, district health work, food hygiene, health education, pest control, and so forth, which are more directly concerned with the protection and improvement of public health than are the other, though equally important, functions of the Urban Services Department : such as the maintenance of parks and playgrounds, the control of beaches, public cleansing and refuse disposal. For this reason the suggestion has been made from time to time that within the
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45
Department there should be two distinct sub-departments, one dealing with the general matters such as I referred to just now, and the other with functions more directly concerned with public health. This distinction is, I believe, followed by many local authorities and on the face of it there is something to be said for the proposal. If we were to consider the reorganization of the structure of the department on some such lines as these, I am sure that my friend the Director of Medical & Health Services would be prepared to consider any reasonable proposals for associating the health officers more closely in the daily work of the Council and the department.
My friend Dr. Lee also referred to the need for more street washing vehicles, and to the effect of water shortages on street cleansing. In point of fact, street cleansing is not curtailed by water restrictions, since there is ample well and nullah water available, and, in fact, even sufficient to take round to public latrines, markets and slaughter-houses for washing when mains water is cut off. It was not therefore considered necessary to incur the expense of adapting vehicles to take sea water, or to experiment in desalting sea water.
The question of the number of vehicles was considered by the Scavenging and Conservancy Select Committee last summer and later by the Estimates Select Committee. It was decided to ask for only six more vehicles in the current financial year, and this has now been approved. This will double our present fleet, and no member of either Select Committee suggested that we should go further at this stage. With the increased establishment and working two or three shifts a day we will be able thoroughly to cleanse all accessible roads, pavements, side channels and scavenging lanes in the built-up areas at least once a week.
Three members referred to the hawker problem and I think they struck the right note. On the one hand, to use Dr. Woo's words, hawkers should be recognized as a distinct trading community with the right and opportunity of making a livelihood; on the other, as was pointed out by Mr. Cheong-Leen, they should not be allowed to cause undue interference with the rights and amenities of the public at large. The problem of how to reconcile these two principles, which are to some extent conflicting, is one of the most difficult tasks which faces the Council. It is a problem which has always been with us, but I would venture to
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grateful to all members of this Council for their very kind help during the past year and I can assure members that I would be delighted to receive any comments or criticisms of our work in order that the functions of the Council could be made more effective and more realistic. (Applause).
CHAIRMAN :—It will doubtless have been observed that among the many
matters raised by Members in their speeches last month, housing and slum clearance received the most attention. This was also the case last year, and, indeed, it is not surprising in view of the predominance of this great social problem in the Colony. I do not intend, however, to deal with either of these matters in my reply today. Questions connected with the work of the Housing Authority are best dealt with in the meetings of that body; while, as to slum clearance, Government has agreed that a housing survey must be conducted first, before the Special Committee on Housing can submit any further recommendations.
One other important matter was raised last month which is also not strictly speaking within the sphere of the Council-the question of the franchise and of the electoral register. I will see that the remarks of the Member in question are noted in the proper quarters.
Turning now to other matters, both Dr. Lee and Dr. Bell spoke in favour of the creation of a separate Department of Public Health under the control of this Council. Public Health, as Dr. Lee said, covers a wide field; it embraces such matters as port health, school health, M.C.H., social hygiene, epidemiology and so forth. I do not think one could support the suggestion— if indeed there is such a suggestion-that all these services and the staff responsible for them should now be brought under the control of this Council. However, it is true that within the field of environmental hygiene, which is the Council's main concern at present, there are important sections of our work, such, for instance, as the control and inspection of licensed premises, district health work, food hygiene, health education, pest control, and so forth, which are more directly concerned with the protec- tion and improvement of public health than are the other, though equally important, functions of the Urban Services Department : such as the maintenance of parks and playgrounds, the control of beaches, public cleansing and refuse disposal. For this reason the suggestion has been made from time to time that within the
HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
45
Department there should be two distinct sub-departments, one dealing with the general matters such as I referred to just now, and the other with functions more directly concerned with public health. This distinction is, I believe, followed by many local authorities and on the face of it there is something to be said for the proposal. If we were to consider the reorganization of the structure of the department on some such lines as these, I am sure that my friend the Director of Medical & Health Services would be prepared to consider any reasonable proposals for associating the health officers more closely in the daily work of the Council and the department.
My friend Dr. Lee also referred to the need for more street washing vehicles, and to the effect of water shortages on street cleansing. In point of fact, street cleansing is not curtailed by water restrictions, since there is ample well and nullah water available, and, in fact, even sufficient to take round to public latrines, markets and slaughter-houses for washing when mains water is cut off. It was not therefore considered necessary to incur the expense of adapting vehicles to take sea water, or to experiment in desalting sea water.
The question of the number of vehicles was considered by the Scavenging and Conservancy Select Committee last summer and later by the Estimates Select Committee. It was decided to ask for only six more vehicles in the current financial year, and this has now been approved. This will double our present fleet, and no member of either Select Committee suggested that we should go further at this stage. With the increased establish- ment and working two or three shifts a day we will be able thoroughly to cleanse all accessible roads, pavements, side channels and scavenging lanes in the built-up areas at least once a week.
Three members referred to the hawker problem and I think they struck the right note. On the one hand, to use Dr. Woo's words, hawkers should be recognized as a distinct trading com- munity with the right and opportunity of making a livelihood; on the other, as was pointed out by Mr. Cheong-Leen, they should not be allowed to cause undue interference with the rights and amenities of the public at large. The problem of how to reconcile these two principles, which are to some extent conflicting, is one of the most difficult tasks which faces the Council. It is a problem which has always been with us, but I would venture to
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